The Americas is a 2025 nature documentary series that embarks on an ambitious journey from the Arctic to Patagonia, capturing the continent’s diverse ecosystems and wildlife. Produced by the BBC Studios Natural History Unit in collaboration with NBC, the series is narrated by Tom Hanks and features an original score by Hans Zimmer. Over five years and 180 expeditions, the production team documented rare animal behaviors and previously unseen natural phenomena, offering viewers an immersive experience into the continent’s rich biodiversity.
A New Benchmark in Nature Storytelling
What makes The Americas so impactful is not just its technical ambition but its narrative heart. Narrated by Tom Hanks and scored by Hans Zimmer, the series combines the cinematic scale of an epic feature film with the intimacy and urgency of a personal journey through the natural world.
The production team traveled to some of the most remote and extreme locations on the continent to capture never-before-seen behaviors in animals such as jaguars, grizzly bears, condors, glass frogs, and monarch butterflies. In many cases, the footage shows species adapting in real time to the effects of climate change, urban development, and deforestation.
Far from being a static “landscape” documentary, each episode of The Americas focuses on a specific biome and its challenges: the melting permafrost of the Canadian Arctic, the drought-stricken prairies of the United States, the rapidly shrinking Amazon basin.
Check out the trailer of the documentary The Americas
Who Created The Americas Documentary?
The project was led by Óscar Cusó, a Spanish biologist and disciple of David Attenborough, who served as lead scientific advisor and on-camera guide in several segments of the series. Cusó, now considered one of the rising stars of environmental communication in Europe, spent more than two years in the field during the production.
Each frame of The Americas is a testament to patience and persistence: crews waited weeks to capture the rare blooming of desert plants in Baja California or a glacier calving event in Patagonia. “This series is not just about beauty,” said Cusó in a recent interview. “It’s about urgency. About the fragility we are finally beginning to understand.”
Where Can You Watch The Americas?
The series premiered globally on NBC in the U.S. and is available for streaming via Peacock. In Spain and Latin America, it is distributed through Movistar Plus+, where it debuted to strong critical acclaim.
Audiences have praised the show’s balance between awe and education. Viewers have taken to social media to call it “the Planet Earth of our generation,” noting how the use of drone technology, thermal cameras, and underwater cinematography allows for an unprecedented immersion.
Why The Americas Matters
Amid the climate crisis, nature documentaries have evolved from observational to confrontational. The Americas does not shy away from the damage humans have done. But it also offers hope: conservation success stories, grassroots movements, and signs of species recovery are woven into the narrative.
Perhaps the most powerful message of the series is this: we are part of this continent—not separate from it. From the way we plant our cities to how we treat water, soil, and sky, every action reverberates across ecosystems.
By turning its lens on a single hemisphere, The Americas reminds us that some of the most urgent environmental stories are not in faraway lands—they are right here, under our feet.
A Must-Watch for 2025
If you’ve been wondering, “Is The Americas worth watching?” the answer is an emphatic yes. More than a documentary, it’s a love letter to the land we live on—and a wake-up call to protect it.
As environmental storytelling enters a new era, The Americas sets a gold standard: beautiful, brave, and utterly necessary.
By: Valeria Benavides Velarde
